There is a restaurant in Victoria that I am almost incapable of avoiding during any visit to that lovely little city. Pagliacci’s was the scene of more than a few fun nights out with friends while we procrastinated on assignments from UVic and has subsequently become a place that speaks to me of good memories along with good food. I am positively addicted to their dish called the Prawn Broker (spinach pasta, prawns and cashews in a coconut-curry sauce) and will admit with no hesitation that I always order the full size — which is far too big for one sitting — so that I can enjoy just a little bit more later. (Side note: Every few weeks I search the Internet in the apparently feeble hope that the recipe will magically appear. Future blogging may include attempts to recreate the thing myself. Success is not guaranteed.)

But, while the Prawn Broker is my main dish of choice, I could very easily live on the baskets of focaccia set on the table shortly after ordering. Chewy, thickly crusted, salty. I have no idea what magic lies in that recipe which leads to such bready perfection. I can only presume part of the reason is a thick dousing of olive oil. But there are no apparent herbs or crystals of salt to hint at what else goes into this recipe.

My pursuit of focaccia perfection began about a year ago when I bought (finally!) a handheld mixer. (Friends were unsurprisingly baffled when I made cookies without a mixer, using my own arm strength to cream butter and sugar together.) To my delight, it came with two dough hooks, which opened up the world of bread baking. Okay, so, it’s a pretty limited world at this point, but nevertheless. Since then, I’ve tried to make focaccia a few times, but found it lacking. Where i wanted dense and chewy, these attempts were light and, at one point, crumbly (don’t try to make bread with all-purpose flour, apparently). The top was delicious, owing mostly to a liberal sprinkling of flaky Maldon salt, chopped rosemary and a few generous glugs of olive oil that filled in the divots I had dimpled across the surface of the pale dough. But it wasn’t the best ever.

Baking bread, I fear, is one of those arts that is being lost in my generation. The reason I never made bread before was that, frankly, kneading baffles me. I never seem to get the dough to come together and never seem to have the patience to keep going. Growing up, my mum often made homemade bread and I would “help” but eventually she would take over the kneading. (This is why the dough hooks were such a welcome addition to my mixer.) But also lost is the knowledge on how to affect the outcome of recipes.

I was sharing the focaccia dilemma with my friend Shelley one afternoon when she asked me a few questions about the recipe and I mentioned that it called for the dough to rise three times. Well, she said, that explained why it was so light. Fewer chances to rise = denser dough. Of course, now that she has said that, it makes perfect sense. But since I didn’t know much about baking bread, it didn’t occur to me to play around with the recipe. Of course, now that i *do* know, I’m making it a mission to make the best focaccia possible.

This time I tried a different recipe, but modified it slightly by not letting it rise a second time in the hope it would produce a chewier end result. It definitely did. But it’s still not as good as the bread from Pagliacci’s and I felt the focaccia overall could have used some more flavour. The top was pretty good, though, owing I’m sure to the generous amount of salt, olive oil and chopped rosemary.

And so, the pursuit continues.

Here is the latest attempt. It comes from the fabulous Rebar Modern Food Cookbook, which, as previously mentioned, I bought only for a salad dressing recipe. In this case, however, I didn’t let it rise a second time and I didn’t bother with the garlic, as I find it very hard to keep it from burning. There are few tastes worse than burnt garlic. This is the recipe as printed.

Rosemary Garlic Foccacia

• 1 3/4 cups warm water
• 1 tbsp. traditional baking yeast
• 1/2 tsp. sugar
• 2 tsp. salt
• 1/4 cup olive oil
• 4 cups unbleached flour

Topping

• 4-6 garlic cloves, minced
• 4 tbsp. olive oil
• 2 tsp. coarse salt
• 2 tbsp. chopped rosemary
• cracked black pepper

In a large mixing bowl, combine the warm water, yeast and sugar. Let the mixture sit until it foams. Stir in salt and olive oil, then start adding flour, one cup at a time, beating well with a wooden spoon. (Yeah, I used my mixer here.) When you can no longer stir, turn the dough out on a floured surface and knead in the remaining flour. Knead the dough until smooth and elastic, sprinkling just enough flour on the counter to prevent sticking.

Form the dough into a ball and place a large, lightly oiled bowl. Cover with a clean, damp cloth and set the bowl in a warm, draft-free spot. Let rise until doubled in bulk (1 - 1 1/2 hours). Punch the dough down and let it rise again until doubled.

Pre-heat the oven to 350F. Place the dough on a well-oiled 12″x16″ baking sheet with 1/2″ sides. Gently stretch the dough to roughly fit the dimensions of the pan. Drizzle the surface with olive oil and spread the minced garlic over the entire area. Sprinkle chopped rosemary evenly on top, followed by coarse salt. Finish with cracked pepper. Using your fingertips, gently poke indentations over the entire surface. It should appear dimpled and rustic-looking. Let rise again for about 15 minutes, or just until it puffs up slightly.

Place the loaf in the center rack of the oven. Bake for 20 minutes, rotating the pan halfway through. The garlic should be lightly golden. Be careful not to over bake. Serve warm.

Most smart bakers know to make sure everything is ready to go in advance of getting started. I am, apparently, not a smart baker.

We were celebrating a (much belated) birthday for a good friend. Some wiggling around with the schedule had the celebration moved from brunch to Sunday night dinner and I volunteered (most willingly — any excuse to bake) to bring the birthday dessert. All week I Googled for moist, rich chocolate cake recipes and then sat there trying to decide which would be better: mayo-based or buttermilk; white icing or chocolate; cupcakes or layer cake. Finally, when I shared my dilemma with a friend, she queried why I wasn’t using a Barefoot Contessa recipe. Indeed! Why wasn’t I?

She has two recipes in her books and one online at Food & Wine. Since I already bought the books, I figured I may as well try one of those and, at last, settled on the Chocolate Cupcakes with Peanut Butter Icing. My love of this combination knows no bounds, so I’m kind of surprised I didn’t think of this recipe immediately.

Initially, it was all going very well. I ran out to the store to buy sour cream, buttermilk and coffee, along with whipping cream for the icing, then returned to begin. There was butter to soften and dry ingredients to sift (and, boy did I sift those. I learned my lesson from the Red Velvet cake when not sifting the cocoa with the flour led to brown swirls through the cake.) and, of course, photos to take to document my progress.

Cakes still make me a bit nervous. I’m worried I’ll overmix and make a tough cake and that is not eased by the fact most recipes have this whole “mix in thirds” step. What if it’s not exactly thirds? Also, I think a lot of recipes these days assume people have stand mixers, which makes this step (among others) much easier, then when trying to hold the mixer while pouring in a third of the dry mixture and not end up covered in cocoa and flour dust.

But, for the most part, it all went really well. The batter seemed incredibly light at the end (Okay, and, yes, it did taste good.) and I was all ready to put the batter into the tins. I pulled out my cupcake liners and found I only had five left. Gah! Thankfully, there’s a grocery store a little over a block away, so I turned off the oven and bolted down there where I bought some liners and then raced back. I was really worried that extra time would ruin the batter somehow.

In the end, it was only a 15-minute delay and I don’t think it affected the cupcakes. They baked up perfectly, though for less time than the recipe suggested owing, I suspect, to the fact that my muffin tins are more shallow and took less batter to fill. (I used a 1/8 cup scoop, which worked perfectly. No spillage.)

The cupcakes are not overly sweet, which was a nice counterpoint to the rich peanut butter icing.

This recipe is from Barefoot Contessa at Home.

Chocolate Cupcakes with Peanut Butter Icing

• 12 tbsp. unsalted butter, at room temperature (that’s 3/4 cup for those of us that don’t use sticks of butter)
• 2/3 cup granulated sugar
• 2/3 cup light brown sugar, packed
• 2 extra-large eggs, at room temperature
• 2 tsp. pure vanilla extract
• 1 cup buttermilk, shaken, at room temperature
• 1/2 cup sour cream, at room temperature
• 2 tbsp. brewed coffee (Full disclosure: I don’t drink coffee. I made a cup of instant and it tasted awful to me, so I only threw in less than a tablespoon. I suspect good coffee may be a great addition.)
• 1 3/4 cups all-purpose flour
• 1 cup good cocoa powder
• 1 1/2 tsp. baking soda
• 1/2 tsp. kosher salt

Preheat oven to 350 degrees. Line cupcake pans with paper liners.

In the bowl of an electric mixer fitted with a paddle attachment, cream the butter and two sugars on high speed until light and fluffy, approximately five minutes. (For those of us without a stand mixer, a handheld is just fine. It just makes it a bit trickier when mixing in the wet and dry ingredients.) Lower the speed to medium, add the eggs one at a time, then add the vanilla and mix well. In a separate bowl, whisk together the buttermilk, sour cream and coffee. In another bowl, sift together the flour, cocoa, baking soda and salt. On low speed, add the buttermilk mixture and the flour mixture alternately in thirds to the mixer bowl, beginning with the buttermilk mixture and ending with the flour mixture. Mix only until blended. Fold the batter with a rubber spatula to be sure it’s completely blended.

Divide the batter among the cupcake pans (one rounded standard ice cream scoop per cup is the right amount). Bake in the middle of the oven for 20 to 25 minutes, until a toothpick comes out clean. Cool for 10 minutes, remove from the pans, and allow to cool completely before frosting.

Frost each cupcake with peanut butter icing and sprinkle with chopped peanuts, if desired.

Kathleen’s Peanut Butter Icing

• 1 cup confectioners’ sugar
• 1 cup creamy peanut butter
• 5 tbsp. unsalted butter, at room temperature
• 3/4 tsp. pure vanilla extract
• 1/4 tsp. kosher salt
• 1/3 cup heavy cream (I used whipping cream)

Place the confectioners’ sugar, peanut butter, butter, vanilla and salt in the bowl of an electric mixer fitted with a paddle attachment. Mix on medium-low speed until creamy, scraping down the bowl with a rubber spatula as you work. Add the cream and beat on high speed until the mixture is light and smooth.

I love scones. I like sweet ones with devonshire cream and jam. I like savoury ones with a little butter.

But scones don’t seem to feel quite the same way about me.

Or maybe they sense fear.

One of the last times I remember making scones was when I was living in a small town in southern Japan. While I was the only foreigner in my community of 10,000, I was eagerly welcomed by many of the locals, including my next door neighbour who preferred to be called Susan. She was married to one of the teachers at the high school where I also taught and they had a young son. (We lived in a rather unattractive triplex — is that what a set of three townhouse-type homes is called, if a duplex means two? — that was teachers’ housing, along with the school’s vice-principal.) She was a very sweet woman who often had me over for dinner and hosted a pretty large (when one considers the relatively tiny size of her living room) dinner party when my then-boyfriend, mum and little sister came over to visit. At any rate, she signed us up for a cooking lesson with a women from the U.S. Naval base, stationed in nearby Sasebo. The subject was, of course, scones.

So, here I was, the lonely foreigner amongst a group of Japanese housewives learning to bake scones from some southern U.S. navy wife. Truly one of the stranger experiences.

Susan and I followed all of the directions faithfully, or so I believed. But our lovely little scones were nothing more than dough rocks by the time they came out of the oven. The instructor was convinced we had done something wrong (and I guess we must have), but I was so confident we had followed the recipe exactly.

I didn’t bother to attempt scones again for several years. Mostly, I suspect, because it’s one thing to bake cookies for a crowd and quite another to show up at work with a pile of scones. And also likely because deep down I harboured some anxiety that I would put in all that effort and still come out with flavoured rocks.

And then I saw a recipe for Carrot and Rosemary Scones.

I love rosemary. And carrots. And dijon mustard. And garlic. And parmesan cheese. The fact that all of these things were combined into a flaky scone was enough to jolt me out of my scone slump.

But it wasn’t going to be a breeze.

When I first attempted these, I found the mixture unbearably dry, but was nervous to add more liquid since I know making a light and fluffy scone requires some delicate baking chemistry. In the end, I did add some more cream, but it was still quite a dry dough. Once baked, the scones were still quite flat and not very brown. That’s not to say they weren’t tasty; they were. But not scone perfection.

The next time I called my mum (to whom I turn for all baking advice, her being a stellar baker and, I suspect, slightly amused by my ongoing need for guidance) and she said to not fear the addition of even more cream as the lack of liquid may have contributed to the rather flat outcome of the first attempt. Take two on the scones was slightly more successful — they were, at least, a little more golden and the dough had come together more easily — but only just. They were still flattish, though.

I sent the recipe along to my mum in advance of a visit out to Vancouver so that we could have a hands-on attempt together. (Baking, I feel, is best learned by participating at the side of an expert.) Not only did we almost double the amount of liquid, but, in the end, they still didn’t rise as much as other scone recipes. We eventually concluded the weight of the carrots was likely the culprit.

On the next attempt, I used my food processor to cut in the butter (justifying it as that I had to pull it out for grating the carrots anyway) and then added much more cream (a mixture of whipping and half-and-half because I wanted to use up the heavier cream) than originally called for. I also accidentally forgot the parmesan. So, I’m unsure which, if either, of those decisions played a role in the outcome, but these scones were beautiful.

They rose! They were tasty! They were flaky!

They still didn’t rise as much as other scone recipes; I blame it on the carrots.

While this recipe originally comes from Clotilde at Chocolate and Zucchini, I have made some adjustments. Below is the recipe as I make it.

Carrot and Rosemary Scones

• 2 cups all-purpose flour
• 1 1/4 tsp. baking powder
• 1 1/4 tsp. salt
• 9 tbsp. chilled, unsalted butter (this is a little more than 1/2 cup if that helps)
• 1 1/2 cups grated carrots
• 2 tbsp. fresh rosemary, chopped
• 2 cloves garlic, peeled and finely minced (I use my handy rasp for this.)
• 2 tbsp. Dijon mustard
• 3/4 cup cream (whipping, half-and-half or a mixture of the two, it doesn’t really matter.)
• 1 cup grated parmesan (I’d go with optional for this because they were so tasty even without the cheese)

Preheat the oven to 350. In a mixing bowl, combine the flour, baking powder and salt. Add the butter and rub it into the flour mixture with your fingers or using a pastry blender or in a food processor, if you have one. It should resemble coarse crumbs when it’s blended enough. Add the carrots, rosemary and cheese if you’re using it.

Mix together the mustard, cream and garlic (I find this distributes the garlic better, but you can also add it when you mix in the carrots) and then add to the dry ingredients. Mix together gently until the dough comes together and then empty out onto floured counter. Pat together into a ball and then roll out until the dough is about a half-inch thick. Cut out using biscuit cutter or whatever is handy. (I used a narrow drinking glass and that worked fine.)

The original recipe calls for 20 minutes in the oven. Mine baked for 17 before they were nice and golden. Cool on a rack. And then try to keep yourself from eating too many.

When the cravings for Guacamole come, they must be answered.

I love avocados. The pale green flesh, the rich buttery taste, the thwack sound the pit makes when I hit it with my knife. I like it sliced in salads or spread between two pieces of buttered toast with a little salt and pepper. But I really love it in guacamole with a handful of salty chips on the side.

Sure, it’s high in fat, but I’m slightly mollified by the fact it’s a good fat and there are lots of vitamins and potassium in avocados. I also need that information to justify my decision to eat guacamole for dinner. (It’s flimsy justification, but justification nonetheless.)

I like to make mine by cubing the avocados while still in their skins and then scooping the chunks out with a spoon before gently stirring with the other ingredients, so the meaty fruit retains some of its bite instead of becoming a paste. (You’ll see below that the instructions are slightly different. Obviously, do as you feel is best.)

It should come as no surprise that this recipe comes from my mentor, the Barefoot Contessa.

Guacamole

• Four ripe Haas avocados (I just buy whatever is in the store)
• 3 tbsp. freshly squeezed lemon juice — one lemon
• 8 dashes Tabasco sauce
• 1/2 cup small-diced red onion
• 1 large clove garlic, minced (I use a rasp — best kitchen gadget ever — so there are no large chunks of garlic)
• 1 tsp. kosher salt
• 1 tsp. freshly ground black pepper
• 1 medium tomato, seeded and small-diced

Cut the avocados in half, remove the pits, and scoop the flesh out of their shells into a large bowl. (I use my hands.) Immediately add the lemon juice, Tabasco, onion, garlic, salt and pepper and toss well. Using a sharp knife, slice through the avocados in the bowl until they are finely diced. Add the tomatoes. Mix well and taste for salt and pepper.

Is it ridiculous that I bought a recipe book solely for a basil salad dressing?

Does it make it better if I explain that the salad dressing goes on one of my all-time favourite salads from a vegetarian/vegan restaurant in Victoria that I must visit each time I’m back in that city? (Especially interesting considering my carnivore ways.)

Nevermind, it was because of the cookbook that I was led to this fabulous cookie. The sweetness of sugar and tang of lime in neat cookie form. I love all things citrus and these certainly satisfy the craving.

Oddly, I never went to Rebar while I lived in Victoria, which I now realize is a huge shame. Still, I get back to the capital city twice a year, so I can keep my cravings for their salad relatively in check. (Hmmm. Perhaps I should blog about the salad dressing….)

Anyway, when I found their recipe book in a store one day, I bought it immediately. When I got home (as I tried to justify the unnecessary purchase of *yet another* cookbook), I started to flip through and inevitably found a bunch of recipes I wanted to try, including the one for the Lime Sugar Cookies.

Sure, it calls for pepitas (pumpkin seeds) and, sure, there was no way I was going to have those on hand and there was no way I was going to buy them. (Surely, the whole point of cookies is that, in general, there is nothing healthy in the mix?) So, I forewent that step and moved ahead.

Then, on the second time making them, I made a very happy mistake. I doubled the recipe, but then didn’t fully double the amount of flour. As a result, the cookies came out a bit denser and with a nice chew, as opposed to the somewhat cake-y versions previously. I now purposely make that mistake. (And, yes, I still don’t bother with the pepitas.)

The one thing to really be aware of with these cookies is that they probably won’t look fully baked, even if they’re ready to be pulled out of the oven. They’ll look puffed, but still very pale with only a hint of golden at the edges. Once you pull them out and they start to cool, they’ll fall slightly and get the nice sort of cracked top to them.

It was raining today when I made these before going in to work. The grey skies made me a bit homesick for Vancouver. But this light and tangy cookies were cheerful, a little taste of summer.

Here is the recipe as printed in the Rebar Modern Food Cookbook. My notes and changes are in italics.

Lime Sugar Cookies

• 1 cup granulated sugar
• 1/4 cup unsalted butter
• 1 tbsp. vegetable oil
• zest of 1 lime
• 1 large egg
• 2 tbsp. lime juice
• 1 3/4 cups unbleached flour (I use all purpose)
• 1/4 cup pepitas (pumpkin seeds), toasted and roughly chopped
• 1/2 tsp. baking soda
• 1/2 tsp salt

Preheat the oven to 350F. Cream the sugar, oil, butter and lime zest until light and fluffy. Add egg and lime juice, and beat together to incorporate.

In a separate bowl, mix the flour, pepitas, baking soda and salt. Add the dry mix to the wet mix and stir together well.

Using a 2 oz. ice cream scoop or forming 3 tbsp balls (or, in my case, a big rounded soup spoon), drop the batter onto a cookie sheet, leaving space in between to allow the cookies to spread during baking. Flatten each slightly and sprinkle with granulated sugar. Bake for eight minutes. Cool on a wire rack.

As I said above, I always double this recipe (11 cookies is not enough), but instead of using 3 1/2 cups of flour, I only use 3. Feel free to try it both ways.

What is it about other people’s versions of the same recipe that inevitably turn out better than yours? I call it Other People’s Salad Syndrome, or Salad Syndrome, for short. I can put the same baby lettuce, grape tomatoes and grated carrot in a bowl, make a basic vinaigrette and it will be fine. My Mum will make it or a friend will whip one together and it will still taste better than one I’ve made.

When I was back in Vancouver a few weeks ago, my Mum made a dinner that included Green Beans with Garlic. In a nutshell, it’s steamed green beans, doused with olive oil that has had chunks of garlic cooked in it, then sprinkled with salt and pepper. We’ve had this many times over the years, and I’m sure I remember a few versions that had long strips of sweet red pepper for colour and flavour contrast.

Still craving another hit of that garlicky, summery taste, I picked up a huge bag of green beans earlier this week. Then, this morning as I was procrastinating (surely, this is one of the top reasons I bake and cook), I thought it would be the perfect time to cook up some beans.

I had double checked the “recipe” with my Mum the night before. (”So, it’s just beans and garlic in oil and salt and pepper, right?” I messaged her in the middle of our online Scrabble game. “Yup.” Alrighty, then.) So, I was good to go.

Oh, except for the fact that for some unknown, unexplained and super annoying reason, the water to my apartment was cut off for several hours today. But, never one to shy away from a challenge, I proceeded anyway. (I can be particularly stubborn and, subsequently, pretty creative.) I had just enough water in my Brita to make three cups of rice (for the other part of my lunch) and to steam the green beans. Thank god I refilled that thing.

Owing to my overwhelming supply of shallots, I thought I’d adjust the recipe slightly and slice up one of those and add it at the last minute to the olive oil. I really liked this touch, as the shallot was a sweet addition, and will do it again in the future. But if you don’t have any lying around, I wouldn’t worry about it.

The idea here is to cook the garlic until it’s tender and has lost its bite in favour of a slightly nutty taste sort of akin to roasted garlic. If the oil’s temperature is too high, the garlic could burn and it will taste very acrid. The key is to watch the amount of bubbling after throwing in the garlic. I also occasionally lift the pot off and swirl the oil around to keep the garlic moving. If you’re going to add some shallot, add it towards the end because it will cook more quickly than the thick-cut garlic.

Anyway, I steamed the beans, cooked the garlic in the oil, added the (what I believe to be) inspired choice of a shallot, tossed it all together with some salt and pepper and sat down to enjoy lunch.

And was disappointed.

It’s not that it wasn’t good. Mmmmm garlic. Mmmmmm slightly sweetened shallot. Mmmmm grean beans. And yet, it still wasn’t as tasty as the version I had just two weeks earlier.

I’m blaming it on Salad Syndrome.

But I’m going to keep working on it because this summery, salad-ish recipe is too good to give up on.

For this recipe, I use Maldon flaked salt. I like the slight crunch of the crystals and that it’s not an overpoweringly salty taste.

Green Beans with Garlic

• 1 pound green beans
• 1/2 cup olive oil, extra virgin preferable for it’s more intense flavour
• 4 cloves garlic, sliced thickly
• 1 or 2 shallots, sliced thickly in rings and then separated
• salt
• pepper

Steam the green beans. (I do it on the stove using a steamer, but only because I’m not sure how to do it in the microwave.) When they are still slightly crisp (I think the technical term is “tender crisp”) and bright green, throw them in a bowl of ice cold water to shock them — stop the cooking process and keep them a nice colour. Strain and throw in a bowl. While the beans are steaming, set a small pot with the olive oil onto a burner set to medium heat. Add the garlic and cook until slightly golden. Toss over beans and then add salt and pepper to taste.

P.S. When all the beans are eaten and there is still all that lovely, garlicky oil left over, it’s pretty delicious with chunks of french bread.

P.P.S. Hmmmm. Having just had another round of beans that have been sitting out since I made them (about two hours ago) and are now about room temperature, I’d say they are even better this way. Maybe *that’s* the trick. When my Mum made them, my sister and I kept picking away at them while the rest of dinner cooked, so they probably were more at room temperature by the time we all sat down.

So, you may want to make them slightly ahead of time and let them cool before enjoying.

I don’t know why I always forget how great T&T supermarket is.

Yesterday, I went grocery shopping. After 10 days away it was time to restock the fridge with vegetables and fresh herbs. I was really craving fresh herbs now that the temperature is starting to climb. (Mother Nature is, apparently, apologizing for the extra long winter by moving us straight into summer.) Safeway was out of basil, though, so after dropping a friend off at the airport this morning, I decided to quickly stop by T&T in the city’s northeast.

Let’s do a little comparison shopping, shall we?

Two shallots at Safeway: $1.99

Bag of eight shallots at T&T: $1.49

Packages of herbs at Safeway: $2.49

Bag of Thai basil about three sizes larger than Safeway’s: $2.64 (by weight)

Okay, so I only needed a little bit of basil, but bonus basil means more room for creativity. Now, instead of one or two recipes that call for the stuff, I can make three or four. With three baby cucumbers sitting in my car (from my aforementioned friend who needed to ditch the last of her produce before heading on holidays), grape tomatoes at home and a package of mint also sitting in my fridge, I remembered this great little summer salad recipe that uses Saifun noodles.

These noodles — also known as mung bean noodles, bean threads or vermicelli — are the perfect summer food. They don’t need to be boiled, just reconstituted in a little hot water, which is easily done while chopping the rest of the ingredients. The noodles are light and when dressed with lime, rice vinegar, garlic and fresh herbs can be very refreshing. The hits of fresh herbs also make it super tasty.

For the record, Thai basil (also known as holy basil, apparently) does not taste the same as traditional Italian basil, so I wouldn’t suggest using it for your favourite tomato sauce or other Italian dishes. But if it’s a Thai, Vietnamese or southeast Asian recipe that calls for basil, you could definitely use Thai basil if you can find it. A lot of Asian grocers seem to carry it, so keep an eye out.

I originally found this recipe in the Edmonton Journal. My additions and changes are noted in italics. Also note that these noodles suck up the vinaigrette like string sponges, so, when in doubt, don’t skimp. Oh, and I like to use those baby cucumbers that seem to be cropping up everywhere these days; they’re less bitter than the long English cukes. Either way, I’d recommend scraping out the seeds because that ups the soggy factor if you’re not eating it all in one go (or, of course, serving it all in one go).

Saifun Salad

• 8 oz. (250 grams) saifun bean thread noodles
• 1 cup grape tomatoes (I chop mine in half so they stretch further)
• 1 small cucumber, diced
• 2 tbsp. chopped fresh mint leaves
• 2 or 3 green onions, minced
• a few cilantro leaves, chopped (cilantro and I are not friends. I do not like it nor understand everyone’s obsession with it. If you like it, by all means add it; I do not.)

Dressing:

• 1/4 cup rice vinegar
• 3 tbsp. sugar
• grated zest and juice of one lime
• 2 tbsp. Thai basil, torn (Of course, if you can only find Italian, that’s fine.)
• 2 garlic cloves, mashed (I mash them, throw them in the dressing, then fish them out just before eating so as to impart as much garlic flavour but without the burn of eating raw garlic.)
• 1 tsp. red chile paste
• 2 tsp. fish sauce
• 2 tsp. soy sauce
• 1/4 cup canola oil (I’m sure any vegetable oil will do. But I wouldn’t use olive oil, which I feel would overpower the light flavours of the salad.)
• 1/2 tsp. sesame oil (I usually don’t add this because I find it overpowering.)

Soak the noodles in a bowl of warm water just until softened, about five minutes, then cook one minute in boiling water. (I simply cover them with boiling water and wait about five or six minutes for them to soften.) Drain and immediately rinse with cold water to stop the cooking. Cover and store in the fridge until ready to make the salad.

Whisk together the dressing ingredients. Taste to check for seasonings.

Place cold noodles in a large salad bowl. Add tomatoes, cucumber, onions and herbs. Top with dressing and toss well, then put the salad in the fridge for about 30 minutes before serving, so the noodles have a chance to soak up the flavours of the dressing.

Say what you will about Facebook, it reunited me with a long-lost recipe for some of the best cookies I’ve baked in a long time.

Of course, it’s a little more convoluted than that.

Let me try to put this in as small a nutshell as possible. Back in high school, I traveled to England for six weeks to spend time with a friend of mine. The summer was pretty awesome: we snuck into pubs with our pitiful fake IDs that should not have helped us gain entry anywhere (Seriously, mine literally said: Canadian I.D.), visited London and Stonehenge, spent a week in a cottage in a seaside town in Wales and basically spent a lot of time hanging out without much parental supervision. But back in Vancouver, a girl whom I had called a best friend (and whose friend we were visiting in England) essentially severed our friendship. Since she had been friends with the girl in England much longer than I, I pulled back.

And then, 15 years later, she found me on Facebook. Did I still make those famous cookies? she queried. Um, what cookies?

Over the course of several e-mail conversations, she then relayed this message: I see you travel a lot. Any chance you’re coming over here any time soon? And I was.

Was I hesitant to reconnect with a person I had not seen, let alone communicated with, in more than a decade? A woman now with a husband and children who probably no longer craves Buck’s Fizz (an awful concoction of fizzy wine and orange juice that I guzzled that summer) and with whom I may no longer have anything in common? Um, yes. But then I arrived in Bristol to a Welcome Home sign coloured by her two children. I was welcomed at the dinner table like family and everything fell into place as if no time had passed other than we have grown wiser (for the most part) and can now legally buy our alcohol.

During the three days in Bristol, she pulled out of her recipe book and showed me the short list of ingredients written in my own bubbled printing that I had given her when we were still teens. I had, apparently, made these all the time. I have no recollection of them. I copied out the recipe — an odd sensation copying something written in my own hand — in my travel journal. Since then, there have been little nudges from overseas, reminding me of the recipe.

So, when a cup of butter sat softened on the counter and my plans to make a type of roll-out cookie had fallen through, it seemed only right to see just why that recipe had stood the test of time.

I am so grateful to have it, and my friend, back in my life.

It’s so basic that I don’t quite understand how all these dull-normal ingredients can come together to make such a thick, chewy cookie. But I’m definitely not going to lose this recipe again.

Long Lost Cookies

• 1 cup butter
• 2/3 cup white sugar
• 2/3 cup brown sugar
• 2 eggs
• 1 tsp. vanilla
• 1 1/2 cups flour
• 1 tsp. salt
• 1 tsp. baking soda
• 2 cups oatmeal
• 1 1/2 cups chocolate chips

(I would consider the addition of nuts or dried cranberries might be a nice touch. But this recipe is pure deliciousness as is, so don’t feel you have to experiment.)

(EDIT: Some people have wondered why there are two types of chocolate chips in my photo. The answer is, quite simply, that I had half of a bag of milk chocolate chips left over from some other baking frenzy and wanted to use them up. Though the combination was good, just use whatever you have on hand.)

Preheat oven to 350. Cream together softened butter and sugars until light. Beat in eggs and vanilla. Add flour, salt and baking soda, then oatmeal. Stir in chocolate chips (and nuts or cranberries, if desired). Bake for 10 - 12 minutes. (I like my cookies a good solid size. These ones I measured out using a mounded soup spoon and they took 12 minutes.) Let cool.

Puff pastry is my new nemesis.

This was supposed to be a ridiculously easy recipe — based on the “fake instead of really bake” principle of entertaining. I don’t believe in cheating, but I do believe that sometimes simplifying is a good way to go … especially when hosting a party. And this had all the things I like assembled together: puff pastry, goat cheese, roasted asparagus.

And yet, not a triumph.

I had my suspicions this wasn’t going to go right from the point of attempting to roll out the thawed pastry. Instead of a nice oblong rectangle, I got a wiggly-edged square that was about half the size of the crust in the photo ripped out of the magazine. No problem, I thought, I’ll make two tarts. It will be daintier, I figured.

After my wiggly-edged oblong was rolled out, I placed it on the parchment-paper-lined pan and docked the hell out of it with a fork. Theoretically, that should have made the centre of the tart not puff quite so much. Emphasis on theoretically.

After 10 minutes of baking, I took a peek into the oven only to be horrified by the mound of pastry puffing up into a golden pillow. NO! I docked you! I prickled your pastry skin with my four-tined fork! Get down! Actually, in reality, I’m pretty sure I just swore, then pulled the damn thing out of the oven and de-puffed it with the aforementioned fork, shattering the pastry.

Then came the attempt to smear on the layer of softened goat cheese. A bit more complicated now that the outer crust was in shards. On the upside, once I managed to successfully get the cheese on, no one could sense the puff pastry disaster that lay underneath. I added the lovely green spears of asparagus, some lemon zest and put it back on the oven, at the same time retrieving the second wobbly oblong that had also grown into a big puffed pillow. And repeat.

As I assembled the second tart, I felt the urge to check the progress on the first only to discover the edges were starting to move beyond golden and into burnt territory. Gah! The asparagus still hadn’t fully roasted, but the pastry was cooking much too fast. I turned the temperature down and adjusted the rack higher and hoped for the best.

However, for all the fuss puff pastry involves, there is one undeniable benefit. Because it’s all thin layers, a solution for the slightly-burnt-bottom-problem was immediately apparent. With a little careful knife work, I pried off the blackened bottom layer. And, lo, all was right.

I don’t think I’ll be attempting this one again. At least not until I get better practiced with the puff pastry. But I would suggest more lemon zest. Also, I squeezed over some lemon juice when the tarts had just come out of the oven, which I think helped add some zing and slightly cut the richness of the goat cheese.

The recipe comes courtesy from Real Simple magazine.

Asparagus Tart

• 1 sheet frozen puff-pastry, thawed (apparently overnight in the fridge is best)
• 1 10-ounce log goat cheese
• 1 1/2 pounds asparagus, ends trimmed
• 1 tbsp. olive oil
• zest of 1/2 lemon
• salt
• freshly ground pepper

Preheat the oven to 400. Roll out the pastry into a 10″x18″ rectangle. Leaving a one-inch border, prick the surface of the pastry all over with a fork. (If this works for anyone else out there, please let me know.) Bake about 15 minutes or until golden, then remove from oven. Spread the cheese over the pastry. Lay the asparagus on top of the cheese. Brush with the oil and sprinkle with the zest salt and pepper. Bake an additional 20 to 25 minutes. Let cool before serving.

I’m starting to think this blog could be very dangerous.

It used to be that when I had strange cravings for late-night sweets or snacks, I could resist them until the temptation passed. But on Thursday night, when an intense and undeniable craving for brownies overwhelmed me, I had a supposedly legitimate reason to fulfill it: I could make a blog entry out of it.

I fear I set a dangerous precedent that night.

When I decided to make the Red Velvet Cake oh-so-many weeks ago, I bought a tin of cocoa — the only one I could find besides the generic grocery brand. Back at home, I discovered that at some point in recent history I had already purchased a tin of Fry’s Cocoa, presumably when I was on some kick to make something chocolate-y and then never followed through. I buried the tin in my baking cupboard — which is, let’s face it, not the most organized space — and completely forgot about it. Until I came home with the second tin.

Brownies seemed like a logical thing to do with an overwhelming supply of cocoa. And, as the snow fell outside (in May for goodness sake), I thought a little baking may be in order.

The best part about the recipe (compliments of the back of the Fry’s Cocoa tin — why research if you don’t have to?) is that I didn’t have to wait for butter to soften as the recipe calls for it to be melted. Virtually instantaneous satisfaction could be achieved!

A little sugar, some vanilla and flour, thoroughly sifted cocoa, eggs and I was good to go. I also had in my cupboard some halved pecans, which I ended up breaking into smaller pieces and throwing into the batter for a little contrast. I didn’t even bother breaking out my hand mixer for this and barely worked out my arm mixing everything together because it took so little effort.

I should have read the recipe all the way through, however, because by the time I got to the fact that four eggs were going into the batter I realized I probably should have halved it. Instead of a nice little pan of brownies, I ended up with a 9″ x 13″ tray of them.

I was too lazy to wander out in the snow for the vanilla ice cream the brownies so badly wanted to be paired with. But, lo, what is this in my fridge? The quarter-cup dregs of whipping cream? Hello freshly-whipped- cream puffed into a little cloud to sit atop my fudgey brownie.

As it was, I didn’t end up having to eat the entire pan myself. I was unexpectedly back at work on my day off the next day and my plans to make cookies for an event that night were dashed. But showing up with a plate of brownies was definitely the next best thing.

Fry’s Fudgey Brownies

• 1 1/3 cups all-purpose flour
• 1 tsp. baking powder
• 1/2 tsp. salt
• 1 cup butter
• 1 cup Fry’s Cocoa (but, presumably, other cocoas would also work)
• 2 cups sugar
• 4 eggs
• 1 1/2 tsp. vanilla
• 1 cup chopped nuts (optional, obviously)

Stir together flour, baking powder and salt in a small bowl. Melt butter in a large saucepan. Remove from heat. Stir in cocoa. Blend in sugar, eggs and vanilla. Blend in dry ingredients and nuts. Pour batter into greased 13×9x2″ rectangular baking pan. Bake in preheated 350 oven for 30 to 35 minutes or until done. Cool.